What Top Chef Had to Say About Unhappy Diner’s Blouse

By Richard Vines -
Jan 7, 2013

Sat Bains looks like a rugby player.

He’s not just physically imposing: He’s actually physical.
He’ll grab you in a bear hug and loudly share with you what’s on
his mind, littering his monologue with expletives. He’s the kind
of man who would make a good friend and a bad enemy.

Bains, 41, also happens to be one of the U.K.’s most
sensitive chefs. He produces dishes of such delicacy that it’s
difficult to square them with such a rumbustious character.

His Restaurant Sat Bains With Rooms placed No. 4 in the
U.K. National Restaurant Awards in October. It’s located on the
edge of an industrial estate in Nottingham, central England, and
holds two Michelin stars.

Now, this English-born offspring of Punjabi parents who
moved to the U.K. in the 1960s has released a cookbook and it’s
predictably large. “Too Many Chiefs, Only One Indian” weighs
three kilograms (6.6 pounds) and costs 75 pounds ($120). The
introduction is by Heston Blumenthal of the Fat Duck.

Bains developed his love of food enjoying meals with his
extended family, and went to catering college to meet girls.

“I started to read books by the great French chefs,
(Auguste) Escoffier, Michel Roux, Pierre Koffmann, and I wanted
to get into the trade,” Bains said in an interview.

He worked hard to achieve that goal, leaving his home in
the English Midlands to work at Le Petit Blanc in Oxford and
L’Escargot in London, before winning the Roux Scholarship, the
premier award for young British chefs. His prize was training in
France at the three-star Le Jardin des Sens, alongside Rene Redzepi, the Danish chef who went on to open Noma in Copenhagen.

El Bulli

A trip with Gordon Ramsay followed, to El Bulli, which held
the title of World’s Best Restaurant before Noma. Bains has also
traveled to Japan on a culinary scholarship, and you can see
these experiences reflected in his dishes, which combine the
modern technology pioneered by Ferran Adria at El Bulli with a
Japanese aesthetic of purity and harmony.

Which isn’t to say there’s anything simple about the
recipes in “Too Many Chiefs.” They’re aimed at professional
chefs, are designed to feed 10 and many require the kind of
equipment (Pacojet, Thermomix, etc.) that even the most skilled
of home cooks may not possess.

The book is beautiful, with photos by John Arandhara-
Blackwell, and the main buyers may be happy diners rather than
food lovers looking for recipe ideas. It most closely resembles
books Adria used to produce at El Bulli, which documented dishes
more than they encouraged their reproduction.

Capital Letters

The text, all in capital letters as if Bains was shouting,
is as robust as its creator. Here are a couple of examples: “A
CHEF SHOULD REALLY ONLY EVER BE JUDGED FOR THEIR TECHNICAL
ABILITY.” And, “NO ONE KNOWS MY FOOD BETTER THAN ME, SO I
CAN’T BE JUDGED ON IT. THAT’S NOT ARROGANT. THAT’S PURE
HONESTY.”

Sometimes, the line between honesty, arrogance and
aggression can be a thin one. Bains says a diner who described
one of his dishes as disgusting was summoned to the kitchen and
told “I’M NOT BEING FUNNY, BUT YOUR BLOUSE IS DISGUSTING.”

Bains is known for his robust response to criticism on
TripAdvisor, telling an unhappy customer his group resembled a
wake. “The only reason the staff stuck around was to make sure
they were still breathing, as a death of grumpy customers is not
something I want on my conscience,” Caterer and Hotelkeeper
quoted him as saying.

It’s modern British cooking with influences from France,
the Nordic region, Spain, India and Japan, to name but a few of
the places. It’s served beside a highway on the outskirts of a
provincial English city, almost two hours from London by train,
an unlikely setting for a meal of such creativity.

(Richard Vines is the chief food critic for Muse, the arts
and leisure section of Bloomberg News. He is U.K. and Ireland
chairman of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants awards. Opinions
expressed are his own.)